I recently finished reading The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters by Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom). I enjoyed the book and wanted to share some thoughts with you. (Or with y’all, depending on where y’all from).

Frequent readers of this blog know a few things about me. You know about my hatred of NULLs and distrust of Wikipedia. You may also know I wrote a book review for The Cult of the Amateur, which helps to explain how websites such as Wikipedia are making many people dumber, not smarter. In The Death of Expertise (DoE from now on, because I’m lazy), Nichols hammers home this point by sharing personal stories as well as data to back up his assertions.

In my career as a data professional, I witnessed examples where a person with less knowledge and experience than another has dismissed the expert as being wrong. At times it would appear the reason for the dismissal is only the result of the person being an expert. It is “hip” to bash someone for the simple reason that they have knowledge and you do not. There were also times I saw an expert opinion dismissed because they “weren’t well known”. This is a common tact by which one person tries to elevate their status by demeaning the status of another.

[Look, if someone wrote code for the SQL Server Engine you might want to take their word for how things work. Their word is better than some random blog post or Wikipedia article. But hey, that’s me. You should do you.]

DoE helps to break down why the human race is getting dumber with each passing year. I’m not going to ruin the book for you, but I do want to share my take on some of the points made in the book.

Access to the internet has made everyone believe they can be an expert in anything. You can’t read a book about databases, or business, or consulting and think you are an expert. And yet, that’s what we are seeing daily. There are many blogs, podcasts, and newsletters from people claiming to be an expert by…well…because they said they were an expert, I guess.

Much of the information searched for online is a result of confirmation bias. That is, we search for or accept information that confirms what we already believe to be true. When facts do surface, they become evidence to support the claim. But anything to the contrary is often dismissed as not reputable, or “fake news”.

The rise of the Internet, along with confirmation bias, also leads to cognitive bias. The most famous cognitive bias is the Dunning-Kruger effect. The simple view of Dunning-Kruger is this: the people who are most certain about being right are also the ones with the least reason for such self confidence. From time to time we all overestimate our abilities. But those of us with the least amount of competence do it the most often. Every profession has over-achievers that aren’t that good at their jobs. Thanks to the Internet, those people are able to GO ALL CAPS AS NECESSARY.

In addition to all of the above, I want to mention that a college education is no longer about knowledge. For over sixty years colleges have been more about being the business of higher education rather than providing an education. Schools are there to make a profit. They do that by having customers (i.e., students). And the customer is always right. This is why issues such as grade inflation exist, along with the idea that everyone wins a trophy.

The end result is that students believe that it is their right to earn an A, regardless of effort, or if they actually know the material. I once witnessed a woman discussing with her professor a failing grade in a class on Real Analysis. She was upset about failing, as can be expected. When she pressed about the grade the professor asked a simple question:

“If I asked you to tell me right now what it meant for an infinite series to converge what would you say?”

Her response?

“I don’t see what that has to do with my grade!”

Colleges are in the business of creating alumni, not scholars. If a college happens to find a person good enough to be both, that’s just a bonus.

Summary

Too many people want shortcuts in life. The internet provides shortcuts for everyone.

The internet also provides a platform for people to profess their expertise in subjects for which they are not experts. It is also great at sharing pictures of cats.

All of the above reasons (and more) are why we are witnessing the Death of Expertise.

But, you should buy the book to read for yourself, and draw your own conclusions. Don’t just take my word for it.

I’m not the expert on such things.